Impossible To Love And Be Wise
by flightofpassage
Summary: Danny finds a really weird love note in his locker...what will it, or, as Clockwork would say, will it not lead to? DS...you know me. Well, probably not, but anyway.
1. Prologue

A/N: I'd like to start off by saying that stuff like this brews in my head for a long time...and then I start writing...and then I get sick of it. Therefore, this fic is going to be relatively quick. I hope you all enjoy it, but I did write it for _myself_. Helpful reviews about how to improve my writing in any way (from grammer to characterization) are more than welcome. Flames from stuppid pepole wh0 cant evin spel rite will be laughed at and are also welcome. I would ask you not to leave flames just because you disagree with my point of view, however. In that case, simply do not get yourself upset by reading. ;)

As Illucian put it in "Helplessly, Hopelessly,""Danny Phantom," all characters, made-up nouns, settings, and previously-conceived plot lines are (c) Butch Hartman. I'm glad we get to play in his world and will try my best to stay loyal to how he'd want to see that world shown to others.

Not, that is, that I won't get a little bit sappier. Or cornier. Or sugarier. Whatever.

Rating is for romancey-ness and safety, not because Nick wouldn't air it if I were good enough to write for them.

Shut UP and write, Flight!

YOU shut up. --

---

"'You're driving me...stark-raving mad'?" Danny read from a hand-held note.

"Is that all?" asked Sam, trying to eye the handwriting.

"No. It also says, 'Ha ha, just kidding.'" Danny paused. "'But I'm not. Don't tell anyone. Love, nobody.' Wow...she signed it 'love.' She's serious!" Danny looked intensely flattered. Sam inwardly rolled her eyes; she could practically see his head expanding.

"Whoever it is sounds like she's got it bad," agreed Tucker. Deep down, he was envying his best friend for the attention, but he was also excited. Maybe something big would happen to the trio soon that didn't have to do with a ghost taking over the town...again. That did get old after living it for a while, odd as it sounds to admit it.

"It could be a prank, Danny," said Sam, a little bit worried. "I mean, even star-crossed lovers don't leave love letters **that** strange."

"But who could it be, then?" asked Danny doubtfully.

"Oh, I don't know. A certain popular preppy-princess, maybe?" Sam remarked in her usual scornful manner. "She just loves to watch you grovel at her feet."

"Sam, why are you always so negative about Paulina? Other than being popular, what has she done to you that's so personal? Just because a person's a little mean sometimes doesn't mean..."

"Why are you so _positive_ about Paulina? She's just cruel to you. She sees nothing but makeup and clothing and money in anyone else, she steps on you all the time, and you act like you're her..._minion_ or something."

Danny opened his mouth to say something, and Tucker quickly interrupted. "Ah-ah-ah, no more soapboxes for today, thank you very much," he said, covering his ears and scrunching up his eyes. "Let's just go have a peaceful, quiet, non-argumentative lunch, shall we? Besides," he added with a glint in his eye, "They've got Sloppy Joes today."

"Yum," said Sam sarcastically, following her best friends away from Danny's locker, thoughts of giant meat piles dancing in her head.

As with most arguments among Danny, Sam, and Tucker, this one was forgotten in the usual laughter and joy of the lunch room. And the meat.

---

All through the next class period, Danny wouldn't stop looking at the note. He compared it to his mental images of various people's handwriting, checking Paulina, Valerie, Star, any and every bully who might try to play an obnoxious joke, every girl whose handwriting he'd ever witnessed, and even Sam. No handwriting matched at all.

Hoping against hope, though, Danny wished Paulina had written it. She wasn't so bad at all! Who doesn't have bad days? Danny knew plenty of people who said mean things and acted ungrateful. Look at how grumpy Sam was. And Paulina wasn't all that bad when she wasn't trying to impress her buddies. She was human, and beautiful...

...absolutely beautiful.

Her blue-green eyes and slender, tall figure, her trendy wardrobe, her flowing black hair, her light flowery scent...and accent, too. And she hadn't always been cruel. Sometimes she'd been sort of kind. Danny didn't think Paulina would be so bad if high school didn't force her to conform so much. It's no one's fault that high school is just like that, right? You have to conform, or you're out of the loop.

She's so hard to get. She won't just hand over her affection to anybody who asks for it. She's got to think you're special.

And really, he was sure that once you got to the bottom of it and really learned who Paulina was on the inside, she wouldn't be as bad as her male counterparts, the jocks. She'd care about him a lot. In fact, he remembered when Kitty had possessed the Casper High queen and he'd really been convinced he mattered to her. Sam and Tuck had each other and Qwan, and he had Paulina. Not that he didn't like Sam and Tuck, or have fun with them, or give them everything, but he'd been waiting for Paulina for practically his whole life! Those were good times. Until--

"Ew," he said aloud, realizing what he'd just thought about a person who was really _Kitty_.

"Care to share, Mister Fenton?" came Lancer's voice from across the room.

"Um…what!"

"What was I just telling you, Mister Fenton?"

Tucker gave Danny a look. "It was Jane Austen," he whispered urgently.

"Jane Austen!" said Danny quickly. Tucker and Sam facepalmed. Lancer sighed.

"Fenton, please keep your ignorant commentary about great literature to an absolute minimum."


	2. Invisible

A/N: Joy, another chapter! Um. Yippee?

---

**Impossible to Love and Be Wise**

**Chapter: Invisible**

_If hearts were unbreakable, then I could just tell you where I stand._

_-Clay Aiken_

---

Samantha Manson threw her backpack against the wall of her room and it made a satisfying clunking sound. She collapsed contentedly to her bed.

Oh, she had both of them fooled! Tucker had always suspected her feelings for Danny, Sam imagined, but she knew he couldn't be sure and he wouldn't confront her about it. And Danny…well, he was a thoughtful kid once he knew what was going on. But before that, he trusted everything everyone said and didn't like to overthink anything. When she said they were just best friends, Danny would totally buy it.

And provided Sam never admitted to having written that weird letter, she could get her feelings out loud and clear anonymously.

"I'm stupid," she said to the empty room.

'It's true, you know,' said her inner cynic, who seemed to take control sometimes. 'You're playing a very risky game here. What makes you think he won't find out or you won't crack and tell him? And besides all that,' it added, 'You're turning into a total emokid.'

Sam smirked at the ceiling. "But it's all I can do for now," she told the ceiling. "Of course I just want us to uh…" She thought hard, and for lack of a better phrase, finished, "be together. If I could just poof us together, I would. But that's really not how he feels. He worships the ground Paulina walks on. And if I told him, I'd ruin everything we've already got between us. Teenage relationships never work. It's not that I think they're always pure hormones, but still…they just don't work out! And Danny and I are different – I mean, we face death all the time."

Sighing in general disgust at her own slightly-coherent babbling, Sam pulled herself into a sitting position. "I'd never admit it, but I hate being a teenager." She reached under her bed and grabbed a tiny, dust-covered book given free with any purchase at Amity Park's bookstore. It was pretty cheap and just full of love-related quotes and Sam wouldn't even want to be caught dead with it, but she could read it alive as long as nobody saw.

"Love is being stupid together," announced Paul Valéry. Sam grinned.

"People who are sensible about love are incapable of it," said Douglas Yates. Inwardly, Sam nodded, completely relating to the feeling of insensibility.

"Never go to bed mad. Stay up and fight," advised Phyllis Diller. Sam almost laughed out loud.

"The course of true love never did run smooth," boomed Shakespeare, and truer words were never spoken.

Sam snapped the book shut. "I can't take it any longer," she said out loud. She wanted to put this masquerade of calmness away and save it for a better time. In the safety of her own room, Sam could do anything she wanted. It was a safety zone, and that shield of gothy coolness wasn't necessary.

After a few minutes of deciding, Sam walked determinedly over to the stereo, which was ready to blast ultra-loud music – just hit the button and CRASHBOOMBANGSMASH.

When she did hit the button, though, Sam's super high-tech mp3 player did not play the usual head-banging tunes. Actually, they were kind of head-banging anyway, but they were much more _lovey_.

Songs about running away together, songs about flying together ('been there, done that,' thought Sam), songs about how one person would always catch the other when she fell…songs about just how hard the hero would fight for the love of his life.

Sam reclined against her bed, shut her eyes, and drifted off to a place where teenhood wasn't so hormone-obsessed and people took her seriously. And places where she wasn't invisible, and where people really wanted to believe she'd written them love letters.

"Sammy, hun, turn the radio down," called Mrs. Manson half-heartedly from downstairs a few minutes later. She knew her daughter couldn't even hear.

---

Meanwhile, Danny Fenton knocked on Tucker Foley's door. After a prolonged silence, a crash, and some scrabbling sounds, Tuck finally answered. A chair or two behind him lay knocked out of the way.

"Dude! Could you help me figure out this letter?" asked Danny brightly, stepping in. Being friends for that long, you start to think it's silly waiting to be asked in.

"I've got my suspicions," said Tucker, quickly getting over the sudden conversation, "but don't you think you might be taking this a bit too seriously? I mean, if she really meant that letter, I think she'd say something more direct. This could very easily be a prank."

It was as though Danny didn't even hear the second nine-tenths of that sentence. "Who do you think sent it?" he begged eagerly.

"Well, if it were real, which I'm not sure it is…honestly, I've suspected Sam all along." He just let the sentence hang in midair, hoping it wouldn't wreak all havoc.

Danny pulled the note out of his pocket, opened it, read it and observed the handwriting, and plunked down on the couch.

"You really think so?"

Tucker nodded. "At first, I dismissed the idea, but all the way through last class, I thought about it. Sam has acted a little too casual toward you and a little too hostile toward Paulina for a long time…and haven't you noticed her dropping little hints all along the way? The fakeout-makeouts, the jealousy toward every female within fifty miles, the blushing…Sam can hide her feelings, but not that well."

Danny leaned back, still reading the note, and grinned very widely. Just to confirm the new idea, he came up with a few more excuses to let his best friend refute. "But it's not even in her handwriting, and I know her handwriting really well…"

"I don't think it matters," said Tuck. "She could have gotten someone else to write it."

"Who else?"

"I don't know." Tucker shrugged. "The point is, anyone who's really interested in sending a good anonymous note wouldn't use her own handwriting."

Danny kept staring at the letter. "Wow," he said softly. "I always thought she thought I was kind of a dunce. So I drive her crazy, eh?"

"I think it's more like…she knows you're a dunce and she likes you for it. And that fact drives her crazy," said Tucker.

Danny went ghost right where he sat, then stood up looking…well…he looked a bit "whomped," to tell the truth. The full magnitude of what he started to believe just hit him.

"Ah, Danny…? What are you doing?"

"Tuck, we have to get this sorted out." Looking nervous, probably more nervous than before most ghost fights, Danny Phantom leapt into the air. "I'll probably talk to you…later. Okay? I'm not sure when." He floated in midair, looking out the window at the twilight, and added, "This is completely surreal."

"Danny! Before you go!" Tucker yelled. "Um, don't tell Sam I told you this. She didn't say anything to be, but…I think she might kill me for it anyway."

---

A/N: Okee, second chapter of setting the scene…I can't even tell if it's interesting or not, since writing it has made me completely jaded.


	3. Collide

A/N: I must be butter, cuz I'm on a roll! X)

P.S. The chapters all have soundtracks, yes :D -is facetomato'd-

---

Impossible To Love And Be Wise 

**Chapter: Collide**

_Don't stop here…_

_I've lost my place…_

_I'm close behind._

_Even the best fall down sometimes,_

_Even the wrong words seem to rhyme;_

_Out of the doubt that fills your mind, you finally find_

_You and I collide._

_-Howie Day_

---

Danny flew through the progressing twilight – the perfect setting for a boy who felt like he was, in fact, in the Twilight Zone.

When he'd told Tucker this felt surreal, he'd meant it. Really.

The more he thought about it, the stupider Danny felt. Of course he'd picked up Sam's hints – he just hadn't paid them much attention because he'd assumed she didn't really feel that way about him. Had it been that he didn't actually want to believe it? Had he only seen what he was _willing_ to believe or had he only seen what he _actually_ believed? There was a big difference.

Danny, caught in the middle of all this musing, almost missed the ghost sitting on the wing of a large commercial airliner making faces (at a terrified passenger, though Danny couldn't know this). It was like a big, hairy, grayish person with big lips and eyes.

"Oh, crud," said Danny at his ghost sense while, highly annoyed, he stopped in midair and zooming toward the plane. Carefully avoiding the jet's engines, the Halfa swooped down from above the ghost and nailed him in the chest, sending him spinning off the plane. The airliner flew on, oblivious to the battle about to begin.

The ghost, meanwhile, turned on Danny and flew quickly at him, but Danny was ready.

"Seriously, don't you guys ever learn that rushing only works when I'm not looking?" he said in the spirit of the fight, quickly blocking the ugly critter with a quick swipe of the hand. Glancing below, Danny couldn't even make out the roof of the Fenton residence, but the dueling pair was so high up that any point in Amity Park would be easily accessible provided he could see it.

Danny flew up, turned around, and dove with all his strength at his enemy, who was a little surprised at the boy's ferocity. The two went intangible and plummeted toward Amity Park; there, Danny could just make out Fenton works, so he kept doggedly in that direction.

Through the sky, through the clouds, through the factory smoke, through the Fenton walls, through Jazz's room by accident…finally, to the basement. Jack tinkered with some random new invention, oblivious to his invisible and intangible son and an ugly airplane ape making a beeline for an open Fenton portal.

"In you go, pal!" cried Danny at last. The ghost disappeared into the green mist and Danny pounded the button to shut the portal door. "Well, that was easy."

Alarms blared.

"Maddie! We've got ghosts!" yelled Jack. "One of them called me 'pal'!"

Snickering, Danny exited through the wall, happy with his own invisibility skills. The alarms would go away soon enough and it would be safe to go human now…

SMACK.

A newly-solid Danny had appeared out of thin air and crashed into Sam on the sidewalk.

"Nice to see you, too," she groaned from the cement.

"Sorry," said Danny, lying opposite. "Ghosts at it again, me distracted, you know the drill."

Cue Extremely Awkward Moment Of Silence. They both sat up, wincing at the complaints of their not-so-funny bones and bruises.

"So, what brings you here?" asked Sam, loathing the silence.

"Ghost fighting," said Danny.

"Oh, right. You told me that," said Sam sheepishly.

"Yup." Danny took a deep breath and removed the battered love note from his pocket. "Sam…I really have to talk to you. It's important. Do you have a while?"

"Uh…sure." Sam caught her breath, staring at the note…she had rehearsed this many times before. He'd accuse her of sending the note, and then she'd act like it was such a pathetic idea he'd just give up on it right then and there.

"Sam, I think you sent me this," admitted Danny plainly.

Now would be a great time to confess, of course. It could even be now or never. What if she never ever got the chance again…? But that was absurd.

Sam laughed very convincingly, because she actually felt some hysteria coming on. Danny couldn't know that, though. He just assumed he'd made a stupid proposition.

"That's hilarious!", she said.

"I'm not in love with anybody!", she said.

"I sit in my room and crush on people you don't know, though," she said.

Now Sam was giggling between words. "Ah, Danny."

Danny gave her one of those intense blue-eyed stares, full of confusion this time. "_He gave me a look you could have poured on a waffle_," sang the stupid book of love quotes from inside Sam's head.

Softening her attitude, she added, "Danny, I'm your best -- one of your best friends." She looked into his eyes, hoping her stare was just as meaningful as his. "It'll always be that way. I'll always care about you – but not in the way that note says. Crushes don't last, Danny. Friendship does."

Danny relaxed and smiled. "Thanks, Sam. I'm sorry I put you on the spot."

Sam shrugged. "No problem. I'd do the same in your shoes. It is a pretty intriguing letter, isn't it?"

"She signed it 'love'!"

"Sometimes, people get caught up in the moment and write things to be more dramatic than they are. If you ask me, this person was a total drama queen already. 'You're driving me stark-raving mad'? Come _ON_."

Danny grinned. "I guess that's true…just wish I could tell who did it and why."

---

She had been his friend for years.

At first, before that fight with the airplane monster, it had been odd for Danny to think of her as anything more, but it was now becoming increasingly less odd. It's as though they were already partners in life without all the fluff that goes with believing that at fourteen. Because honestly…could you really say that it was possible for kissy stuff to add to their relationship? The only thing that could add to it would be time and personal growth. It's true of every friendship.

Oh, being in a quote-official-unquote relationship would make everything _look_ deeper, but it would _feel_ shallower, Danny knew.

He was totally old enough to handle makeouts and chasing pretty girls and feeling wanted.

And Paulina was still totally hot.

But Danny wasn't ready to come out of that time in life when you enjoy the lighter side of life instead of the heavy stuff.

It's not that these were Danny's thoughts exactly as he flew above town, cartwheeling in the now-starry sky, but in that time, he did realize it all.


	4. It's About Life

**Disclaimer Refresher: I don't own "Danny Phantom". Period! End of quotation!**

**Impossible To Love And Be Wise**

**Chapter: It's About Life**

_It's simple, confusing, the truth is I'm winning but I'm losing_

_I'm pulling and pushing won't do me any good_

_It could…it should!_

_I'm honest to myself that the truth is I lied._

_One of these days it all comes together,_

_One of those days that goes on forever._

_Think I sound crazy? Maybe, whatever…_

_-Lillix_

---

Sam was walking downtown. Where to? Nobody knew, not even her.

It hadn't been all lies. Most of it had been true, in fact, including the part about being a "drama queen." Sam freely admitted to being a drama queen.

The part that had been a lie had been the laughing.

Oh, and the "I didn't write the note" bit. That one was **a lie**. Sam had asked to 'borrow' her grandmother's handwriting – her grandmother hadn't written anything for a long time and Danny was unlikely to know it at all. Sam had dictated exactly what she wanted said. Part of the reason she'd made it short and bittersweet was because her grandma's hands weren't what they used to be.

The lie Sam was living was benevolent, right? She didn't want to ruin a good thing. Of course, she had already taken the risk by writing that ridiculous note in the first place. She had needed to do something about it, though – the feeling. If she didn't, she'd end up saying something non-anonymously or else just be miserable for a long time.

Well, come to think of it, Sam could have been as philosophical with herself about the whole thing as she'd been with Danny a few minutes ago.

So altogether, Sam admitted, she sure knew how to be a selfish little snake. She also planned to maintain this façade for some time, until the perfect moment – the perfect moment that would probably be years from now, well away from the awkward Casper High years. She sighed out loud.

Naturally, her little circle of friends had to still be together years from now! Even if they _tried_ to separate, Sam, Tucker, and Danny's lives were too connected now not to be thrown back together sooner or later. Probably, Sam imagined wryly, by a ghost fight bringing Danny sheer across the country.

Still, unless they tried, the trio wouldn't even get _that_ close to separating. They wouldn't let themselves.

As she pondered all this, partially with guilt and partially with hope, Sam arrived in front of the Nasty Burger. She considered going in but decided to just keep walking, even if she didn't know where to; she felt even less like talking to people than usual.

Upon seeing all the activity in town, Sam realized she wasn't very interested in staying here at all; she wheeled around and walked quickly all the way home, carefully avoiding the Fenton residence.

Unfortunately, Tucker and Danny were standing at Sam's own door when she got home.

"Hi, Sam! Where WERE you?" asked Danny, absolutely no hint in his voice that anything awkward had happened.

"Oh, just…walking." Sam forced a smile. She had only walked because she wanted to be alone with her thoughts. Then she came home to lock herself in her room, and the very object of her musings stood at her front door.

"Is there something wrong, Sam?" Tuck asked nervously.

"What? With me? Oh. No. I'm good. …Is there something wrong with you guys?"

"Eh, nah," said Tucker. "Just came to hang out, that's all."

"Let's go to the Nasty Burger for supper again," Danny suggested.

"Yeah, sure," answered Sam. "I don't feel like eating at home – not that I ever have, but still…"

And so with that, the three took off in the exact direction Sam didn't want to go.

---

By the end of the evening, though, everyone was feeling much, much better, Sam included. They had gone to the Nasty Burger (where Tucker gulped down as much meat as humanly possible) and ended up at the movie theater – no one really wanted to watch anything, but one of the horror movies looked really hokey, so they went to laugh at it.

It was about a monster who sat on plane wings and terrorized people (Danny was only slightly freaked at the coincidence). Eventually, all the passengers on this one particular plane had fallen out except this one guy, who was going around trying to take out the monster. At the end, the creature ended up falling off the plane over the Arctic ocean in the middle of a mysteriously-brewed super-storm, but you saw a furry, ragged form dragging itself up onto a glacier during the last scene, and thus the chances for a horrible sequel with the exact same plot – only on a boat - were opened up. The worst thing about the whole movie is that you had no idea who was flying the plane. Obviously, he/she/it never fell out because the plane kept flying, but the pilot didn't seem to know he was in the middle of a badly-scripted horror movie.

As could have been expected, Paulina just had to be in the theater. The trio – much to Sam's dismay – tried to sit near her, but she and her fan club moved. Danny and Tucker were offended. Sam was thrilled.

Paulina also had a habit of screeching at the supposed-to-be-startling parts of the movie. A man opened a door…slowly…slowly…CREEEAAK…and _a mop_ fell suddenly on the floor from behind it. "AIEE!" came a voice in the theater.

Getting quickly bored with the movie, Danny, Sam, and Tucker started throwing snacks in the air to see how easily they could snatch the food from the air. In several instances, heads were banged together as they tried to catch the same piece of popcorn, food was stolen, crazed giggling ensued. Half an hour later, the gang had caused a veritable rain storm of popcorn, Sno Caps, Sour Patch Kids, and Gummi Bears – fortunately, their seats were fairly isolated, so they only got "shush!ed" once. Tucker was trying not to laugh out loud and failing miserably; Danny was snickering hard into his hand; Sam was grinning in her old mischievous way. Then she spotted the back of Paulina's head, several rows down and to the left.

"Psst," she said, and nudged Danny. He and Tucker turned to her, still looking slightly crazed with laughter.

Sam launched a piece of popcorn at Paulina's neatly done hair.

"Ouch!" yelled Paulina, whirling around and rubbing the back of her head. "Who did that?"

Sam had to put her head down on her arms on the seat in front of her to avoid betraying her laughter. Paulina gave the back row in general the hairy eyeball, but couldn't tell exactly who'd done it.

"She can't have been _hurt_ by a kernel of popcorn," Sam giggle-whispered as she looked up. Danny was looking at her with a mixture of chiding and amusement. Tucker was eying them both, smirking.

"Sorry," said Sam, a little embarrassed. She didn't go red as a beet, though – she was having too much fun to get tense.

Danny answered Sam's apology by throwing a kernel of popcorn at the back of Dash's head. Teens will be teens.

---

That night as she curled up in her warm purple PJs beneath her warm, fluffy comforter in her darkly warm bed, Sam wished she had a big warm stuffed animal to hug contentedly. This had been the best night of her life for a while.

Everything was going fine – Danny and Tucker weren't acting weird, Danny wasn't such a fanboy of Paulina's that he couldn't come back to Earth for just a second, she was better than either Tucker or Danny at catching falling food in her mouth…

All in all, laughter really is the best medicine. Sam's glum mood from earlier was gone. She was ready to go on with her life and keep protecting her secret until the perfect moment, and everything was wonderful as far as her best friends were. Not even her parents opening the window to too much sun could ruin this!

---

As Sam tucked herself warmly in, Danny Fenton sat staring out the window, watching the sky and wondering.

Tonight had been all kinds of fun…and it hadn't been awkward. Tucker had suggested he lie low for a while, because things _always_ get awkward when you accuse people of "being in love" with you, but Danny had been too eager for things to get normal again and had proposed spending the evening out.

Danny would never think of Sam the same way again, but on the other hand, he still did.

'Maybe,' he thought as he looked at the moon, 'I just thought I saw more to her than I usually do, and even though I was wrong, I can't stop now.'

---

Yet another chapter…the next one will be the last, the one where the real fireworks happen. I promise they happen.


	5. Seasons of Love

A/N: FINE. I'm such a pushover. I'll write more than one chapter. So this is the second-to-last chapter! AND it's long. Good or bad? Don't ask me ;

It...will get fluffy? I dunno. This is the part where everything starts being a little - as Tucker would say - wonky. Don't say you weren't warned.

I don't own anything having to do with "Danny Phantom" - that goes to Butch Hartman.

---

**Impossible To Love And Be Wise**

**Chapter: Seasons of Love**

_Five-hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes..._

_How do you measure...measure a year?_

_In daylights, in sunsets, in midnights, in cups of coffee,_

_In inches, in miles, in laughter, in strife...in_

_Five-hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes_

_How do you measure a year in the life?_

_**How about love...?**_

_-"Rent"_

**_---_**

'How have we changed in the past three years?' wondered Sam, sitting on the floor outside of Mr. Lancer's room, looking up and down the hallways from this perspective for one of the last times ever.

Hmm. She remembered herself the first time she ever walked down this hall – the unsure little 13/14-year-old, the one who was so proud of her individuality, her gothness, who wore amethyst lipstick and flipped her ponytail upside-down. She'd daringly shown her midriff, mostly because adults didn't like it, and wore formidable black boots.

She was puny back then, wasn't she? This year's freshman seemed to be the size of mice, but Sam realized that's what all freshmen look like when you're on the other side of ninth grade.

Sam looked down at her shoes now. They were still quite formidable. And black. She still liked that. Come to think of it, for Sam, black and purple had become more than a symbol of "goth." It was her permanent color scheme. It's what people thought of when they thought of her.

Now to the changes. Sam didn't wear that green-patterned skirt and those purple tights anymore…now they were just long black jeans, loose-fitting, comfortable, but not falling off. They'd probably become shorts soon, as the weather could get obnoxious. She still preferred a tight-fitting shirt, but had realized at the beginning of junior year that her opinion of people with belly-buttons showing all over the place was dropping lower and lower. Now her usual outfit included merely adark purpletank and black jeans.

Sam didn't flip her hair up anymore. In fact, she didn't put it up at all, just left it at its medium length to hang down around her face as it always had.

Of course, she had to admit,she had gone a little wild with the piercings at the end of sophomore year. She had them all over her ears, the most obvious ones holding bright-green round earrings. Thank goodness they looked good and she'd stopped before trying to pierce, for example, her nose.

One thing that really hadn't changed at all was the purple lipstick. It was a bitlighter than hershirt, but she'd still never brought herself to trash it. Sam's eyes hadn't changed, either…she'd only gotten taller, less gangly and sturdier. Just like everyone else.

Tucker was less gangly, too. As a matter of fact, he was less "techno-geeky." It's not that he'd lost his love for technology, oh no – to the contrary, three years of tech ed courses at Casper High had only strengthened his interest. He just _looked_ less the part. He'd started wearing contacts. He'd let his hair grow, only a little, enough to see from under the beret. He'd grown – the boys were now actually taller than Sam, although they were still a little afraid of her. Tucker – well, Tucker was still a little bit girl-crazy. Some things _really_ don't change.

Danny – aha. Danny. He had definitely grown up – in more than one way. Of course he was taller and stronger – stronger, but not in a grotesque way. He looked like an extremely fit young adult, now, maintaining the same blue eyes, maintaining the same optimistic, slightly naïve but always well-meaning nature.

But he had NEVER let himself grow a goatee. After that run-in with the _almost_ future…eek. He'd forbidden himself a mullet or a goatee, come to think of it. Danny wanted to stay as different as possible from his darker self…

…who, by the way, should be making trouble again any time now. He'd tried it once, but only once, and…well…who wanted to talk about that now?

The trio had also had their run-ins with the opposite gender, Danny the most, Sam the least. She had gone out very briefly with a random kid during sophomore year when she'd been in an extremely rebellious hard-to-get mood, but both of them grew out of "goth" and apart from each other very quickly.

Danny had gone out with Valerie because she'd asked him. Then she'd found out that Danny Fenton _is_ Danny Phantom, and had taken it surprisingly well. Their relationship had always been a fairly casual one, though…they were now great friends, Valerie was one of "the group," they all hunted ghosts together and solved problems that none of them could have solved on their own. It was rapidly becoming a small agency of justice within Amity Park, really. But finally, it got to the point where Danny and Valerie were just fond teammates, and acting any other way made them intensely uncomfortable.

…unlike the way Sam still felt about Danny, though now in a more grown-up way. Back when Danny and Valerie stopped "dating," Sam had kept herself quiet until she arrived at home and jumped for joy in her room. Now Sam was still annoyed to see Danny with anyone else, but she wouldn't stoop to the level of celebrating their failings behind their backs. Well, not in a jumping-up-and-down kind of way, at least.

But perhaps the kissy stuff, if that came these days, wouldn't make everything shallower. Maybe they'd grown enough that their relationship could _change_ without _dumbing down_.

'Nope, don't think about it yet. You'll know when the time is right,' said Sam's conscience, 'and you know it's not now.'

She'd done some stupid things the past few years, too – the occasional piece of Valentine's candy slipped in a backpack or locker, jokes about Danny's choice in girls, too much teasing for tiny reasons. But overall it'd gone well.

Just then Danny left Lancer's classroom in the usual blue jeans, a white shirt and a red vest.

"How'd it go?" asked Sam nervously, biting her lip a little. Lancer had wanted to talk about something, but nobody had any idea exactly what. He didn't seem to want to say.

Danny grinned, one of those wide toothy grins. "Lancer saw me going ghost."

Sam gasped.

"Don't worry, though," he said cheerfully. "Come on…let's walk." And so they started walking, eventually to leave the building.

"Why shouldn't we worry?" whispered Sam. "There's so much he could mess up…"

"He couldn't believe his own eyes anyway," said Danny calmly. "He just told me he saw me go behind the dumpster behind the school and Danny Phantom flew out a couple seconds later."

"Wow. How did you get out of that one?"

"I gave him a story about going behind the dumpster to _catch_ the ghost, but the ghost wasn't me…blah blah blah. Lancer just got a little spooked, so to speak, but he's totally convinced I'm all-human. I'll tell you," Danny added, "people just don't _want_ to believe I'm half-ghost. It should be crystal-clear by now."

Sam nodded. "That was really close, Danny."

As the two began to leave the school, to step out onto the front steps, Tucker's car arrived in front of them.

"How was the meeting?" asked Danny.

"Great!" said Tucker. "We're getting three new computers by the end of the week..." and he continued to drone on about technology as Sam and Danny jumped in the car.

"Hey," said Sam when she saw Paulina's expensive, fancy white and pink car go past Tucker's old green and gray used one. "You know who I haven't heard about from you guys for...months, actually?"

"Who?" chorused the boys.

"Paulina."

Tucker shrugged. "I dunno. Plenty of fish in the sea." Right on cue, he tried to wink at the (older) girl in the car behind him.

"I've...gotten a little tired of her," Danny confessed, ignoring Tuck.

"You mean you've come to your senses," Sam said, smirking.

"No, not really. I'm still the same beef-eating shallow hormone-driven male I've always been," said Danny teasingly, "but we get tired of being rejected after about the millionth time."

---

Two Nasty burgers, one veggie burger, a ghost fight and a car ride later, The Terrific Trio sat on the floor of Danny's room with a set of shoeboxes. One was Sam's, large because of her huge boots. The others were Danny's and Tucker's, and everyone had pictures and notes stuffed in their boxes. Most of those keepsakes centered around The Trio or, later, Valerie.

Memories surfaced, from bad dates to the time Danny, Tucker, Sam, and Valerie got slimed. Paulina scowled at the camera. Junior and senior proms went flying by, as did awkward moments under Christmas mistletoe and indescribably strange birthday gifts from the Fenton family. Jazz went to college(and sent mail constantly).The Box Ghost was paid to haunt Dash's locker ("it is shaped like a long box," argued Danny). Sam wore vampire fangs and a cape for Halloween. Tucker won recognition in the technology department in school. Lancer finished off a messy piece of cake in front of the class.

Notes had been passed, too - everything from impolite doodles of teachers to questions about the homework to minor flirtation. Comments about class. Anticipation of weekends. Secrets that didn't need to remain so --

"Hey, remember this?" asked Danny excitedly. He showed Sam and Tuck a note from years ago that he'd found in his locker.

"Oh, how could I forget that," said Sam, smiling. 'Wow,' she thought. 'Have I really been keeping that secret for three years?'

But after that much time has passed, things that happened in freshman year just don't hold as much interest, and the three friends were preoccupied with remembering people whose names they knew.

The three ended up going for a walk downtown. They had just gotten to talking about college when they saw the front of the cinema.

"_Flight Hazard IV: Vengeance of a Monster_? Four in three years?" laughed Tucker.

"Must be really low-budget," answered Sam.

"Remember that night we were throwing popcorn? During the first one?" Danny asked.

"Yeah," said Sam and Tuck together.

"That was fun." Danny seemed to space a little bit to his two best friends after that moment, but what he was really thinking was the way that entire day had changed the way he saw one of them.

Danny didn't consider himself a lot deeper than he'd been before - he just considered himself much more experienced in every sense of the word, from school and personal life to ghost fighting and "the contest contrary to corruption," as his Phantom half would call it. There was still that central sense of self everyone has, though.

And yet, over the years, Danny realized he wouldn't mind if Sam was crazy about him. In fact, he was pretty disappointed to learn that letter hadn't been hers.

At first, as Danny had thought about it, he'd realized how logical Tucker had been - Sam really did drop hints all the time. Honestly, who makes out with people just for a distraction?

But after that note, even when he'd looked for those hints, they hadn't really been there. She'd even gone out with that other kid for a while, and Danny felt jealous, but tried not to let it show too much. He hoped it passed off easily as mere dislike for Sam's sort-of boyfriend. Funny thing, though, about the daySam hadbroken up with the punk. Danny had run home and jumped for joy in the bedroom.

Oh, not that he wanted them to be unhappy. He just selfishly wasn't crushed to see them unhappy _with each other_.

---

A week later, Sam threw a very quiet graduation party for Danny, Tucker, Valerie, and herself; Jazz also stopped by for a little while to obsess over her little brother and his little friends and how much they all meant to her and how much she looked forward to keeping up the ghost-hunting work, if that was necessary, of course - not that she wanted more ghosts to attack the town or anything --

"Thanks, Jazz," said Sam after this had gone on for a minute.

"I'm glad we all know now," Danny said with relief. "It's a drag having to be all secretive."

"You still have to keep it from most people," Valerie pointed out. "Like your parents. And Mr. Lancer."

"Yeah," Danny replied, grinning mischievously, "but I wouldn't tell them half the stuff about my life, anyway."

---

That evening, before going to bed, Danny wrote a note with his left hand.

"Someone is mad about you, but he's too shy to say anything."

And the next day, he left it in Sam's mailbox, then played stupid when she asked if he had written it.

**_---_**

A/N: Those weren't the fireworks, as it wasn't the last chapter. Neener.


	6. Dreaming of You

A/N: It's almost over right this second! Last chapter!Go ahead! Celebrate! Whee…

P.S. The dorms are modeled after real ones, though only in appearance.

---

**Impossible To Love And Be Wise**

**Chapter: Dreaming of You**

_Late at night when all the world is sleeping,_

_I stay up and think of you --_

_And I still can't believe_

_That you came up to me and said_

_'I love you...'_

_**I love you too.**_

_-Selena_

_---_

Eleven o'clock on a Friday night. Okay, this would be a good time. Sam wouldn't expect him, but was that not the point?

"Well, point of no return," said Danny to his roommate. "Wish me luck."

"You don't need any," said Tucker from the other side of the room, in front of a laptop screen. "I've told you that since the ninth grade - for a grand total of seven years."

Danny grinned mischievously. "If you're wrong, you owe me."

Tucker laughed. "How about when I'm right, _you_ owe _me_?"

Danny shook his head, still smiling nervously, and went intangible-ghost. Out the door and into the narrow, tiny hallway of Amity Hall University. Up one level, through the ceiling and into the hall of the dorms above. He leaned against the wall for a moment, to think.

It had really been that last battle with Phantom two years ago that had solidified his feelings for her. She had made herself just as open to battle as Danny did on a regular basis with one major difference - she didn't have any ghost powers. Sam was usually not the warm and fuzzy type, at least not to your face, but she went the extra mile when it mattered. He'd ended up saving everyone in Amity Park - as he had, again, on a regular basis - and she hadn't even pointedly reminded him how deeply she'd endangered herself for his sake.

She'd tried to use the Fenton Thermos on Phantom without notifying anyone and without any help, guidance or advantage. How much more daring can a person get?

All in all, he suspected Sam had been crushing on him since ninth grade. Danny had been pretty slow on the uptake, as far as that went, and his feelings had come slowly, too. Only in retrospect did he understand that she - and Tucker as well, really, though obviously in a different way - meant more to him than any of the popular cheerleaders and various other failures had at Casper High. Even Paulina.

Just to get it straight, Danny didn't dislike Paulina. He'd simply learned the hard way - time and time again - year after year - that looks aren't everything. Slowly he'd even realized that in a contest between "beauty" and "character," character would win.

Enough. He'd spent five minutes procrastinating.

An intangible Danny Phantom became Danny Fenton and knocked on a dorm door. Valerie opened it.

"Hey, Danny!" she said, surprised. "Um, you're not really supposed to be here, are you?"

"Hi, Val. I'm not...uh...can I just speak to Sam, please?"

Sam appeared behind Valerie. "Hi, Danny! What's up?"

"Hey. Uh. The next floor?"

Crickets chirped in the half-ghost's head as awkward glances were exchanged.

"All these years and you still need new jokes," said Sam, half reproachful and half amused.

"I actually wanted to talk to you," Danny said in a hurry, trying to sound very casual. "Er, shall we walk?"

"Oh! Okay," said Sam brightly, probably innocent of what Danny had to say. As she walked past Valerie, Danny thought he saw Valerie give Sam a meaningful glance, to which Sam responded with a playful elbowing. She clearly didn't actually expect anything...

The two started walking, with an awkward silence.

"So...you wanted to say something?" Sam asked after a moment.

"Yeah. Um, yes. Let's just get to the front steps, okay? I don't want anyone in those rooms to eavesdrop." Sam shrugged as Danny said this.

When finally the two arrived on the front stoop of the building and sat down, though, Danny procrastinated even more. "How about you come with me," he said, grabbing Sam's hand and going ghost.

"What?" Sam asked, alarmed. She hadn't expected a field trip at all.

"Sam, what I'm going to tell you is _very important_," said Danny. "I don't think this is...uh..." he faltered, not knowing exactly how to describe it. "The right place. I don't think it's the right place."

What could she do? They took off. This reminded her of something that had happened once before...the flying, that day years ago. She would never forget that day.Butthat was beautiful in a "seeing-the-entire-town" way, in a sunny way, in an escapist way, and it was...really awkward. This time it was moonlit and starlit and she wondered what was even the purpose.

"So," said Danny nervously. "I'm glad Mom and Dad were okay with me coming here. I still feel a little bad, though."

Sam couldn't help laughing out loud. "Woooow...Danny, that was completely random." He was talking about the fact that the Fentons had discovered that Danny was protecting them for a long time and encouraged him whole-heartedly to go to college, even though he was very guilty about possibly leaving the family alone around ghosts. Fortunately, Amity Hall University was not far at all from the house, so a quick communication and a quick flight would have the ghost boy back at his hometown's side in no time at all.

"Well," he said, a trace of his impish nature coming out, "I think it's not the only random thing that will be happening this evening."

Sam looked directly up into her friend's face. "What?"

He didn't respond, but kept glancing around, finally spotting a hilly meadow. As the pair landed and Danny went human, Sam finally got her hopes up. A moonlit meadow with fireflies and starlight? Come on! This only happens in those famous romances you read about in class, and everyone knows what happens when they land in such a setting...

"It's time!" cried a happy little voice inside. It came from the mental image of a tiny book of love quotations. It had become her muse, really, that book.

"Someone's burning something," said Danny pleasantly, making small talk, and it was true - as they looked back toward campus, over a range of hills, they smelled someone's campfire or stove.

"Danny!" said Sam suddenly, whipping around to face him. If she didn't take advantage of this moment - and she KNEW it was right - she might never say it. Even though she was sure of Danny's intentions that night, well. If you want something done right, you do it yourself.

"Do you remember that note?" asked Sam, swallowing.

"You're gonna have to be more specific," teased Danny, partly shy, partly cocky.

"The one you got in ninth grade from some random crazy girl who we didn't know who she was that I didn't write and neither did Paulina or Valerie?"

"...Yeah! I couldn't forget that in a million years. I still don't know who it was!"

"Danny, I do," said Sam, swallowing and nudging him on the shoulder to get his attention away from the skyline. He looked at her, wide-eyed, and, unbeknownst to her, hardly daring to believe what he'd come to hope.

"I've known for a very long time," she said.

"I lied to you for years," she said.

"The truth is..." she said,

"**I wrote that note and it all still applies**," she finished, letting the sentence hang in midair, hoping it wouldn't wreak all havoc.

Her friend grinned very widely, white-toothed. "You did - really?" he paused and settled down. "...Really?"

She smiled, no longer afraid to look into his summer-blue eyes. "Really."

"That's a great thing," said Danny, "because remember The Mailbox Note?"

"You didn't!" Sam gasped, unable to control her smile.

"Yep."

The two embraced.

"I can't believe we were so oblivious for...for seven years!" Danny laughed when they finally separated a bit to look at each other's faces. "We were...I mean, **_I_** was so _naive_!"

Sam reached up and kissed him, the first genuine kiss they'd ever shared. It beat every single one of those fakeout makeouts from when they were kids. It beat every time someone had dared them to kiss in "Truth or Dare." It beat every spin-the-bottle kiss and lived up to every fantasy kiss. There was something more than simple suggestion in it, something long-intended and long-desired and long-_expected_.

"Well," she said, grabbing his hand and sitting down with him on the miraculously-dry grass, "you know what they say about this stuff."

"What do they say?" asked Danny.

Sam purposely looked up at the stars and the moonlight, realizing they were the same ones she'd looked on the night after she read that stupid Love Book.

"It is impossible to love and be wise."

"Love?" asked Danny, startled but grinning. "Well, I'm glad you said it, because otherwise, I would have had to make it official, and who knows how many years that one could take."


End file.
